[China Glass Network] Many people responsible for import procurement or import and export business will complain that the period of importing raw materials and products is very long. But when asked why they are so long, the answer is too simple. It is often said that importers, foreign manufacturers or freight forwarders say so. And this perfunctory or evasiveness allows us to reduce the incentives or opportunities to improve the entire import channel. National Flag Bandana,Flag Scarf,Head Wrap Lingshang E-Commerce Co., Ltd. , http://www.nbscarf.com
In many cases, information or documents lag behind the actual work steps in the supply chain. For example, many companies are passively waiting after ordering from foreign manufacturers, especially after the goods arrive at the port for several days before the arrival of the freight forwarder or the carrier. Some companies may attribute this to poor quality of service for freight forwarders or carriers, but that's it. In fact, we should take a more proactive approach here:
First, through the understanding of the entire process, the relevant service providers are required to provide timely and accurate information. Timely means not only waiting for the information to be notified after each step is completed, but asking the service provider or supplier in the channel to provide the prior forecast as much as possible. For the handling of customs declaration, the more traditional way is to wait until the arrival of the goods, obtain the relevant documents (packing list and commercial invoices) from the freight forwarder or carrier, and then start the customs declaration. As a result, sometimes due to the delivery of documents or the correction processing time for the wrong documents, the time for customs clearance is delayed, which inevitably generates additional storage costs (many carriers and freight forwarders generally provide free storage time) and demurrage . A better solution would be to get the relevant documents from the shipper before the goods arrive, so that the customs clearance is more calm.
Second, make a strict plan (or even a timetable) for the connection of each step, and determine the responsibilities of the parties in advance.
Third, work with the various participants in the supply channel to compress the cycle time until the supplier's production cycle. The control of the cycle time of the entire international freight transport (especially the import business) is very important. Since its period is generally long, the instability is correspondingly increased.
According to most of the previous articles on product and raw material inventory control, we know that this long cycle and excessive instability make us have to consider setting a higher cycle inventory when designing the supply chain inventory level. And safety stock. Otherwise, we will have to lower the expected service level of the supply channel. This is bound to cause a shortage of regular goods. In solving the above problems, new methods and concepts such as e-commerce, bonded warehouses and supply centers (SupplyCenter) are currently used.